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Tuesday, March 27, 2018

European Parliament admits Jewish population is diminishing in the European Union

In an non-official document "prepared for, and addressed to, the Members and staff of the European Parliament as background material to assist them in their parliamentary work" acknowledges that the Jewish population in the European Union is declining. In 2915 it stood at a little above 1 million. It is clear from the document that there is nothing it can do to reverse the situation.

Jewish communities in the European Union

The Jewish population in the EU has been declining. It dropped from around 1.12 million in 2009 to 1.08 million in 2015, though it is difficult to give precise numbers as some countries do not collect ethnic data. The Jewish population in France, the largest in the EU, declined from about 500,000 in 2002 to 460,000 in 2015. Emigration, mainly to Israel, is the main factor behind the trend, which has intensified in recent years, among other things due to harassment, discrimination and hate crimes against Jews.

Diminishing Jewish population

Centuries ago, Jews were persecuted as a religious minority, while in the last century the belief that Jews were a threat to the state was a driving force behind the Holocaust. Today Jews are targeted mainly because of events in the Middle East, although some anti-Semitic sentiments also revolve around the Holocaust. According to a 2015 report by the EU Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA), the main perpetrators of anti-Semitic incidents are neo-Nazis, far-right or far-left sympathisers, Muslim fundamentalists and the younger generation. The report states that anti-Semitic behaviour is mainly characterised by denial and trivialisation of the Holocaust, glorification of the Nazi past, anti-Semitic sentiment due to property-restitution laws and hatred because of Israeli policies. It includes verbal and physical violence; threats; insults of Jews going to synagogues; harassment of rabbis; repeated attacks on Jews wearing symbols of their religion; hate speech; anti-Semitic bullying in schools; and damage to property, including arson.

Growing violence against Jews
Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, encouraged French Jews to come to Israel after the killings of kosher supermarket customers in Paris in January 2015, four years after a deadly attack on a Jewish school in Toulouse. Many Jews have considered following his advice, although some eventually return. According to a 2013 survey on anti-Semitism in eight EU Member States, 21% of respondents experienced verbal or physical violence or harassment because they were Jews. The numbers may underestimate the reality, since 76% of victims of anti-Semitic hate crime do not report it.